


CITRINE

by flyingraysonss



Category: Bandom, Cobra Starship, The Academy Is...
Genre: M/M, Mental Health Issues, could be a breakup, potential angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-10-25
Updated: 2016-10-25
Packaged: 2018-08-27 00:31:29
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,282
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8380687
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flyingraysonss/pseuds/flyingraysonss
Summary: On the topic being broken; William is and Gabe less so. "Gabe makes him porridge and William prods it, mashes it, drops the whole spoon in it so the handle becomes all sticky and he has to get a new one and leave the old in the sink. William doesn’t like porridge. It’s cloying and lumpy, bits get stuck between his teeth, it doesn’t taste of anything. William doesn’t like porridge and he spends enough time trying to hide that fact, to make it look like he’s eating, that Gabe sighs and says he’s really got to be going and that he’ll be back from work at usual time and please make sure to check the post."very short because i cannot write long things





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Panic4Panic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Panic4Panic/gifts).



> This is for Jay because she completes me. 
> 
> Also originally based on a piece i wrote for my enrichment with a 1000 word limit so thats why it's quite small

“I just want to _know_ ,” Gabe pleads, his voice barely louder than a whisper - as if he’s afraid of disturbing something tranquil. There’s nothing tranquil. William-and-Gabe are made up of many things but tranquillity has never been one of them. William turns over; gaze resettles on the cold, white wall. He hears Gabe sigh behind him, he hears Gabe sit up, sheets crinkling as they fall away from his bare waist. He can hear Gabe’ despair and he thinks it sounds nice next to his own bemusement. Gabe just wants to know but that’s not a request William can fulfil – he doesn’t know how to phrase it, he doesn’t know how to say it, he doesn’t even know what it is.

Gabe gets up while William remains silent, walking into the kitchen in his green boxers and with sticking, mussed up hair. In-the-morning-Gabe is one of William’s favourite types of Gabe – except when he isn’t. In-the-morning-Gabe is somehow able to function perfectly after waking up five minutes ago, he can go in the kitchen and make \coffee and hum along with the radio, can brush his teeth and get changed and do his hair and turn the kettle off and call William into the kitchen for the breakfast he just made – all in the time it takes William to yawn, sit up and shrug on a faded sweatshirt.

Gabe makes him porridge and William prods it, mashes it, drops the whole spoon in it so the handle becomes all sticky and he has to get a new one and leave the old in the sink. William doesn’t like porridge. It’s cloying and lumpy, bits get stuck between his teeth, it doesn’t taste of anything. William doesn’t like porridge and he spends enough time trying to hide that fact, to make it look like he’s eating, that Gabe sighs and says he’s really got to be going and that he’ll be back from work at usual time and please make sure to check the post. William waits for the door to shut before he scrapes his chair back and retreats back to bed. The untouched porridge is flushed down the toilet.

It’s become a bit of a habit for William to spend all day in bed and there yet to be a day where there was an exception. He technically wasn’t in bed though, more so curled on top of it, trying to ignore the burning in his arm and the headache in his head, trying to ignore the nagging thoughts that he should make the bed and clean the bathroom and the kitchen and maybe then the lounge.

If William was to have one true talent, it would probably be ignoring things. Like time. Somehow eleven hours had passed in the space of five minutes and numerous dreams about how dirty the guestroom window was.

“Did any letters come today?” Gabe asks, walking into the room, his grin fully audio through his voice. It must have been a good day at work for him. Maybe, maybe William could ask Gabe about it, make usual conversation like usual people but he’s still not too sure what Gabe’ job actually entails and he doesn’t think he could actually get out of bed, let alone use his voice.

“Bill?” Gabe questions and it makes William wince. “Have you actually been out of bed today after I left?”  

William shrugs, because honestly – he’s not sure. Time tends to smudge together when it’s just him and his head and maybe he had been out of bed today but he can’t actually remember.   

“Bill,” Gabe sighs and his eyes look so dark and sad when he sighs and William doesn’t like it, especially when he knows he’s the cause of it. Sometimes William wonders why Gabe is still with him when it’s blatant Gabe would be so much happier elsewhere. “Bill – I know I said I’d drop it but seriously, seriously Bill I’m worried. Do you need to see Xanthe more often? I can ring her if you can’t.”  

William shakes his head – once, twice, thrice. Gabe was right – he had said he’d drop it. And he wasn’t. William didn’t need to see Xanthe, he didn’t need to listen to her try to analyse him and write down his faults, he didn’t need her to arrange hospital appointments and new prescriptions, he didn’t need the way she looked over the top of her glasses despite her young age, he didn’t need the way all sympathy from her just sounded so fake.

“Bill,” Gabe repeats and William didn’t think he’d ever hated his own name so much. “Bill – please just. Talk to me? You never tell me anything anymore – you never say anything to me anymore. I can’t remember the last time we had a proper conversation – Bill, please.” William couldn’t remember their last conversation either. It probably had been a while ago. 

“Will!” Gabe exclaims and William gets the idea he’s been saying the same thing over and over. “William are you even listening to me?”       

William blinks and slowly nods his head once, twice, thrice.         

Gabe sighs, rubbing under his eyes and ducking his head. He straightens up though, looking William in the eye with faux-calmness. “Bill baby.” Gabe doesn’t call William Bill that often. William stiffens. “Bill – Will – William. Look, I just. I worry about you. Ever since we moved in together – you’ve been acting more and more unlike you – unlike the you I met. And I can’t help but think – is it because of me? Am I making you unhappy?"        

Forget his insides bleeding, William’s insides are ice. Gabe isn’t making William unhappy – William doesn’t think he’s unhappy, per see. He’s more just – stuck. Drifting aimlessly. It’s not anyone’s fault but his own – he was never very good at maps. He wants to tell Gabe all this, explain to Gabe that he loves him so much and Gabe can’t be credited for any of William’s failures – they belong to William himself – only. Only William can’t get his voice to work. He opens his mouth. He closes it. A failed, shuddered croak comes out in between. William opens his mouth again. The room is silent.     

“Bill?” Gabe asks again, a sort of forlorn quality to his voice.

William can only shake his head – frantically – once, twice, thrice. Gabe looks disappointed – and maybe like he was resigned to that answer - which isn’t fair. William would speak, only, only he didn’t think he could. Once upon a time William had been a good partner for Gabe. What a long time ago that had been.

“Look, I’ll,” Gabe sighs “I’ll make dinner – we can eat. Have some time to think. But Bill – please Bill. Just – just. Just try.”       

William watched Gabe walk into the kitchen and William wonders what Gabe wants him to try that he’s not already.        

Maybe dinner but William’s not going to try dinner because he’s not hungry. Gabe makes some pasta dish with salad and it looks pretty but William doesn’t want it. He picks his salad apart and pulls the leaves into tiny little pieces. Gabe looks unamused through the whole thing – Gabe looks like he’s trying not to look. William doesn’t mind so much. His head is buzzing and it would be nice to lie down – so William goes and does that. He puts his plate in the sink first, of course, and scrapes the pasta in the bin but Gabe still looks disappointed.        

The bed, despite Bill spending all day on it, is still messy and William can’t put it off any longer, he’s been woken from his daze and he needs to tidy it only every time he tries to pull the blanket another corner comes untucked and the duvet’s gone all lumpy one end and the sheets aren’t pulled down over the mattress enough and –

William doesn’t realise he’s crying till Gabe comes in and points out that yes, he’s crying.

“The pillows – the pillows. I can’t get them right. They don’t go right.” William’s voice is barely more than a whisper. It scratches his throat, sounds coarse and old and really things are so much simpler when William doesn’t have to talk. He doesn’t want to talk but he needs to explain the pillows, he needs for Gabe to not think him a freak.     

“Bill,” Gabe exclaims gently, “Bill the pillows are fine.”   

“They’re wrinkled,” William mutters and he hates how pathetic he sounds, like he’s about to burst into tears any minute and the fact he can’t talk at a normal volume.

“Bill…” Gabe tries but Gabe doesn’t get it, Gabe can deal with the wrinkles but William can’t, he can’t deal with the wrinkles at all they make it so the pillows don’t lie right, so they don’t fit right and they need to fit right, if the pillows don’t fit and touch and feel right then who knows what else can be not right and there is already so much that doesn’t fit, William doesn’t need anything more – especially when it’s something like _pillows,_ something that William should be able to fix.   

“Will – Bill – c’mon. We’re going to bed, it doesn’t matter.”  

“It’s six o’clock,” William checks with Gabe’ alarm clock.         

Gabe shrugs, “I can do with an early night. And so can you – you look so exhausted baby.”   

 _Baby. Baby._ William’s not a fucking child; he doesn’t need pet names apart from he kind of does. It just sounds so nice, it’s comforting – it reminds him of when he could speak properly, not just to complain about pillows. His head rests it’s volume, he lays down with Gabe curled around him. Maybe he’ll wake up and will be okay.  

Maybe not. William tries to sleep – he tries but his arm won’t stop itching and he feels so gross and maybe a bath will settle his head.

The bathroom’s white and eerie in the dark; William pays no heed to it. Instead he sits in the bathtub, putting the shower on over him and tries to wash every scrap of skin he can. His arm still feels so disgusting and the cloth covering that was one of the first clothing items to go as he takes the flannel and scrubs, and scrubs. It just makes his arm hurt more but it makes it clean, it makes all of him clean and William continues scrubbing at raw flesh till the water runs cold and Gabe wakes up alone and comes to investigate – and even then Gabe has to physically pull the flannel away from him and life him out the shower.        

Afterwards, William sits newly dressed on their bed, Gabe brushing though his long hair and not speaking. William’s not speaking either. It’s obviously a bad idea.       

“Bill,” Gabe says carefully, smoothing out the last knot and putting the hairbrush on the bed next to him. “Will – Will this isn’t working.”

William can actually hear his heart break which, huh. He always thought broken hearts were a figure of speech, a metaphor featuring in Virginia Woolf’s works and then a faded few philosophical studies. It didn’t seem so though, William’s pretty sure that the stabbing in his chest are the pieces of his heart piercing all flesh around them, tiny little splinters tearing his insides apart.

“William.” William’s not looking at him but he knows Gabe is biting his lip. He sounds so young and uncertain, so unsure and awkward, William doesn’t get it. “William – I don’t think we can be together anymore.”

“No!” Williams reply startles even himself – Gabe jumps about five feet in the air. “No, no please, no, no, I can’t – I need you – please – please, I can’t – please no, no-”

“-William,” Gabe interrupts, his voice firm and then almost shaking. “William. You need help.”

“I – I can get help. I’ll call Xanthe or-”  

“-Will. You need proper help. I’ve spoken to Xanthe; I’ve spoken to your parents. We all agree you need proper, actual help.”   

“I-“  

“-You need to be independent from me. Bill this hurts me too – but you’re getting worse. You don’t eat anything; you freak out when you can’t get the pillows to look right. You barely ever talk, you barely ever respond. You spend hours in the shower – and scrub your fucking skin raw while you do it! Have you even seen your arm? Bill the water was red when I took you out!”

“It was dirty,” William bit his lip. Even before he said it he knew Gabe wouldn’t take it well. “You don’t understand.”

“Then let me understand,” Gabe begged, “tell me! I just want to know.”

 William’s insides gave another painful squirm, more razor sharp fragments piercing through the flesh around them. Maybe this was what it felt like to die.

“Will – look I don’t want to do this. But it’s for the best. You need help – help I can’t give. I’m not changing anything, making you any better and I don’t have time to.”       

Scratch that – _this_ is what dying felt like.

William didn’t watch Gabe go. He went and hid himself in the bathroom and when he came out after heaven knows how long, Gabe wasn’t there. Neither were half his clothes or his shoes or his keys or phone charger or coat.

William could see Gabe walking away out the big windows, and he could always open them and yell at him and make some romantic gesture to make Gabe come back. But it was getting dark and bugs would come in and William didn’t like the wind. Instead, he stood and pulled the dark curtains over the glass. His fate was already sealed – and he’d never been very good at romantics anyways.

 

**Author's Note:**

> PLease review ahhh.  
> And sorry the tenses might be a bit shit but that's because i am shit as a person


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